These wines can be purchased on line from Taste McLaren Vale – check it out here.
Willunga Creek Wines 2007 Out for a Duck Cabernet Shiraz
Now for my favourite wine from the Willunga Creek Wines range and interestingly it is a Cabernet and Shiraz blend creating a good outcome. There is that sweet fruit plum with a slight vanilla aroma. The flavours are a mixture of plums and blackcurrent with some slight herbaceousness that blends well with the soft oak to produce a long lasting effect. Please bring me steak, charred from a BBQ smothered in onions and mushrooms.
Sabella Vineyards 2007 Shiraz
The aromas start with the typical berries one sees with McLaren Vale, and end with what I can only describe as the smell of freshly cooked cinnamon donuts – how different is that! The cinnamon continues on the flavour profile and I suspect this comes from the clever use of oak and the various oak toasting combinations. The flavours also include the usual plum characters your find in McLaren Vale Shiraz. The tannins are soft and combine into a lingering experience. The oak profile lends this wine to be a good match for some herb encrusted lamb and fresh seasonal vegetables.
Sellicks Hill Wines 2006 Valletta Grenache Shiraz
This wine is a Grenache & Shiraz blend that has been in barrel for 3 years and is one of my favourites. Time has been kind to this wine infusion. There is a musk lolly smell here and I cannot remember smelling this quite the same before. An aniseed infusion into the dark fruits here with a vanilla hit on the back of the nose. The palate shows darker fruits than I expected from a wine that is Grenache based. There is a strength but elegance here that is absolutely intriguing and so is the fennel based finish to such a blend. I was concerned with the 3 years in oak, but I should not have as it is just part of the wine. This wine can be drunk now or left for a few more years to show its best. For me I am not sure I can wait – so break out the BBQ Pork Spare Ribs and I may just share some of the wine with you.
Marius 2006Simpatico Single Vineyard McLaren Vale Shiraz
From one of my favouite McLaren Vale producers – a medium bodied Shiraz flushed with good red fruits on the nose and palate (cherries and red currents). Hints of oak of the American kind combines with fine tannins and the reliable McLaren Vale soft mid palate and great acidity create a wine worth drinking and enjoying. The winemaker, Roger, tells me that out of his range almost everybody likes this wine and I can see why. You could drink it now but I suspect this will only get better in the coming 5+ years – if you can leave it that long.
Try taking this wine to a BBQ and you would have many friends that suddenly understand that the wine they brought was not up to standards that should be set for red wine enjoyment.
Seldom Inn 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon
The fruit for this was mainly from 40 year old vines with this vintage picked early for McLaren Vale Cabernet that year and it missed most of the heat wave of that year. The best word for the aromas was “Black” and the second word would be intensity. The flavours were just layers of blackcurrent fruit with just lovely tannin complexity that leaves the mouth screaming for more. This wine needs more time to reach its best but worth the wait it would be. Sit it aside for 5+ years and try it with Beef Wellington.
Caught Red Handed 2008 McLaren Vale Shiraz
Fruit cake on the nose – cherries, plums and mulberries with just a hint of oak and spice (nutmeg and cinnamon). The first thing I notice on the palate is the lack of alcohol – this wine packs a punch at 15.6% alcohol but I do not get the bitter finish that I thought would happen. There is enough fruit character and acid to balance with the alcohol. The wine flavours are the same as for the aromas – one big mouthful of fruit cake with those lovely spices. This is definitely a food wine and the bigger the better – so try it with a slow cooked Beef Burgundy with creamy mashed potato and crisp beans.
